Methodological Pluralism and the Methods of Comparative Constitutional Law

Da Silva, Michael (2019) Methodological Pluralism and the Methods of Comparative Constitutional Law. International Comparative, Policy & Ethics Law Review, 2 (3), 631-672.

Record type: Article

Abstract

This article defends comparative constitutional law’s status as a genuine academic discipline capable of producing knowledge. In so doing, it argues that common claims about the necessary conditions for being an academic discipline are false: a field does not need a unique method or set of methods to be an academic discipline. Comparative constitutional law requires multiple methods to produce the valuable knowledge that makes the product of comparative constitutional law
research unique, but it remains a discipline. It is not the only example of an academic discipline that does not fulfill the claimed methodological conditions on disciplinarily. A discipline with multiple methods must nonetheless ensure that its practitioners pair methods with purposes that the methods can fulfill. This article thus also provides a new taxonomy of legitimate comparative constitutional law purposes and methods and explains which methods can fulfill which purposes. The taxonomy is itself a contribution to the literature: no other short methodological reference work is currently available.

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